4 ms·

What if I look like a famous actor/actress or model? Should I not be allowed to act or model professionally? Or if I sound like a famous singer, should I not b

What if I look like a famous actor/actress or model? Should I not be allowed to act or model professionally? Or if I sound like a famous singer, should I not be allowed to sing for profit? What if my paintings have a similar style to a famous painter, should I not be allowed to paint for a living?

threeseed 2y ago
[flagged]
- bgentry 2y ago
  Fairly sure I understand the public details about this situation. We have at least one newspaper that has reviewed recordings or footage from the voice actor and confirmed that the OpenAI voice is a direct match for her actual regular speaking voice. We also have records illustrating that the CEO had no direct involvement in the hiring of the voice talent, and that there was no direction given for her to "sound like 'Her'". Without any evidence that OpenAI set out to intentionally find someone who sounded like a fictional character, why should this individual be prevented from seeking work as a voice actor in any capacity?
- orangecat 2y ago
  They wanted Scarlett Johansson specifically, couldn't get her and then hired someone They hired the Sky voice actress well before contacting SJ. with the intent to convince the public it was her. The only evidence for this is Sam's "her" tweet, which can easily be referring to the concept of a realistically-voiced AI assistant rather than SJ in particular.
  - notaustinpowers 2y ago
    > They hired the Sky voice actress well before contacting SJ. Then why would they need to contact SJ 2 days before the release? If they already had the Sky voice complete? If there wouldn't be enough time to have SJ record everything for the voice? To me, it doesn't pass the sniff test. Either their talent department is just really bad at planning and had no clue it was releasing just two days later (unlikely), or they were trying to get an agreement signed with her before the release, anticipating that this would happen (likely).
    - orangecat 2y ago
      Then why would they need to contact SJ 2 days before the release? According to OpenAI, they wanted SJ for a separate voice (https://openai.com/index/how-the-voices-for-chatgpt-were-chosen/ https://openai.com/index/how-the-voices-for-chatgpt-were-cho...), possibly as a "one more thing" conclusion to the demo. You can say that they're lying, and certainly OpenAI doesn't have the highest credibility at the moment, but it's at least plausible. or they were trying to get an agreement signed with her before the release, anticipating that this would happen (likely) If they anticipated this would happen, why wouldn't they just ditch the Sky voice altogether?
      - notaustinpowers 2y ago
        > If they anticipated this would happen, why wouldn't they just ditch the Sky voice altogether? This is my opinion so it's not factual. They already don't have any qualms making billions of dollars operating with a maybe-illegal-but-definitely-not-cool business model that hoovers up copyrighted content without compensated authors to use their works to train models to reproduce similar works, again without compensating any copyright owners. Why would they act different when it's one celebrity? Sugar Daddy Microsoft has enough money and lawyers to throw at SJ to keep her busy until she either croaks or goes broke. Also, why would MS or OpenAI lose out on a billion dollars in stock growth with the release of ChatGPT4.o when, for a few million dollars, you can do whatever you want.
telesilla 2y ago
Actors use stage names all the time because the actors union doesn't allow duplicate names. Emma Stone's birthname for example is Emily Stone, who is another actor. Actors and musicians are also known to seek as much uniqueness as possible to be able to trade on that uniqueness. If you were a talented singer or painter you'd have trained early on to develop your own distinct voice or style, it's how the music and art schools work.
surfingdino 2y ago
If you impersonate another actor for profit claiming to be him/her you may be facing legal action. There is a difference in selling yourself as "Scarlett Johansson" vs. "A Scarlett Johansson impersonator" vs. your own name/stage name. If it's covert and deceiving, you are in trouble, if it is overt, you are fine and that's why they world has so many Elvis impersonators. Although I see a new market opening for Kate Moss impersonators https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40498668 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40498668 When it comes to works of art, if you tell the buyers/viewers it's yours you are fine, but if you paint a copy of a famous painting and claim it to be the original one, you are a criminal.
- bgentry 2y ago
  Do you have evidence that this voice actor was billing herself as a Scarlett Johansson impersonator or anything of that sort?
  - nicce 2y ago
    Advertising by using Her and contacting Scarlett befohand are the dooming factors. Likely not actor’s fault but instead the leads of OpenAI.
  - surfingdino 2y ago
    You were asking about a hypothetical situation in which you may find yourself. That's what I addressed in my reply. The person whose voice was used does not pretend to be SJ afaik. It's the communications between OpenAI and SJ and Altman's tweets that created an ambiguous situation similar to someone trying to ask an attractive person out, being told it's not going to happen, but publicly winking and suggesting that there is something going on. It backfired. OpenAI and Altman are trying to get out of it, but their time of being the darlings of the media is over. There will be more scrutiny of their actions.
- amanzi 2y ago
  I'm not a lawyer, so I don't know if this is relevant or not, but it's not really Scarlett Johansson's voice we're talking about, it's "the character in Her that Scarlett Johansson voiced". I'd be surprised if Scarlett's natural voice matches the one in Her - I assume she would have changed her pitch and/or cadence for the movie to match the director's requirements. Samantha's voice in Her has a subtle, 'not-quite-natural' sound to it, which would make sense for a computer-generated voice. Can the movie studio that produced Her claim copyright over Samantha's voice? If they release "Her 2" without Scarlett Johansson, could the movie studio hire someone who sounds like Scarlett to play Samantha's character? I don't think this case is as simple as people make it out to be. Even Sam Altman's tweet: "Her", seems to confirm they took inspiration from the movie Her, so is it wrong to hire a voice actor that sounds like the character in the movie? If Sam had tweeted, "Scarlett", then it would be very different.

threeseed 2y ago

[flagged]

bgentry 2y ago
Fairly sure I understand the public details about this situation. We have at least one newspaper that has reviewed recordings or footage from the voice actor and confirmed that the OpenAI voice is a direct match for her actual regular speaking voice. We also have records illustrating that the CEO had no direct involvement in the hiring of the voice talent, and that there was no direction given for her to "sound like 'Her'". Without any evidence that OpenAI set out to intentionally find someone who sounded like a fictional character, why should this individual be prevented from seeking work as a voice actor in any capacity?
orangecat 2y ago
They wanted Scarlett Johansson specifically, couldn't get her and then hired someone They hired the Sky voice actress well before contacting SJ. with the intent to convince the public it was her. The only evidence for this is Sam's "her" tweet, which can easily be referring to the concept of a realistically-voiced AI assistant rather than SJ in particular.
- notaustinpowers 2y ago
  > They hired the Sky voice actress well before contacting SJ. Then why would they need to contact SJ 2 days before the release? If they already had the Sky voice complete? If there wouldn't be enough time to have SJ record everything for the voice? To me, it doesn't pass the sniff test. Either their talent department is just really bad at planning and had no clue it was releasing just two days later (unlikely), or they were trying to get an agreement signed with her before the release, anticipating that this would happen (likely).
  - orangecat 2y ago
    Then why would they need to contact SJ 2 days before the release? According to OpenAI, they wanted SJ for a separate voice (https://openai.com/index/how-the-voices-for-chatgpt-were-chosen/ https://openai.com/index/how-the-voices-for-chatgpt-were-cho...), possibly as a "one more thing" conclusion to the demo. You can say that they're lying, and certainly OpenAI doesn't have the highest credibility at the moment, but it's at least plausible. or they were trying to get an agreement signed with her before the release, anticipating that this would happen (likely) If they anticipated this would happen, why wouldn't they just ditch the Sky voice altogether?
    - notaustinpowers 2y ago
      > If they anticipated this would happen, why wouldn't they just ditch the Sky voice altogether? This is my opinion so it's not factual. They already don't have any qualms making billions of dollars operating with a maybe-illegal-but-definitely-not-cool business model that hoovers up copyrighted content without compensated authors to use their works to train models to reproduce similar works, again without compensating any copyright owners. Why would they act different when it's one celebrity? Sugar Daddy Microsoft has enough money and lawyers to throw at SJ to keep her busy until she either croaks or goes broke. Also, why would MS or OpenAI lose out on a billion dollars in stock growth with the release of ChatGPT4.o when, for a few million dollars, you can do whatever you want.

telesilla 2y ago

Actors use stage names all the time because the actors union doesn't allow duplicate names. Emma Stone's birthname for example is Emily Stone, who is another actor. Actors and musicians are also known to seek as much uniqueness as possible to be able to trade on that uniqueness. If you were a talented singer or painter you'd have trained early on to develop your own distinct voice or style, it's how the music and art schools work.

surfingdino 2y ago

If you impersonate another actor for profit claiming to be him/her you may be facing legal action. There is a difference in selling yourself as "Scarlett Johansson" vs. "A Scarlett Johansson impersonator" vs. your own name/stage name. If it's covert and deceiving, you are in trouble, if it is overt, you are fine and that's why they world has so many Elvis impersonators. Although I see a new market opening for Kate Moss impersonators https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40498668 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40498668 When it comes to works of art, if you tell the buyers/viewers it's yours you are fine, but if you paint a copy of a famous painting and claim it to be the original one, you are a criminal.

bgentry 2y ago
Do you have evidence that this voice actor was billing herself as a Scarlett Johansson impersonator or anything of that sort?
- nicce 2y ago
  Advertising by using Her and contacting Scarlett befohand are the dooming factors. Likely not actor’s fault but instead the leads of OpenAI.
- surfingdino 2y ago
  You were asking about a hypothetical situation in which you may find yourself. That's what I addressed in my reply. The person whose voice was used does not pretend to be SJ afaik. It's the communications between OpenAI and SJ and Altman's tweets that created an ambiguous situation similar to someone trying to ask an attractive person out, being told it's not going to happen, but publicly winking and suggesting that there is something going on. It backfired. OpenAI and Altman are trying to get out of it, but their time of being the darlings of the media is over. There will be more scrutiny of their actions.
amanzi 2y ago
I'm not a lawyer, so I don't know if this is relevant or not, but it's not really Scarlett Johansson's voice we're talking about, it's "the character in Her that Scarlett Johansson voiced". I'd be surprised if Scarlett's natural voice matches the one in Her - I assume she would have changed her pitch and/or cadence for the movie to match the director's requirements. Samantha's voice in Her has a subtle, 'not-quite-natural' sound to it, which would make sense for a computer-generated voice. Can the movie studio that produced Her claim copyright over Samantha's voice? If they release "Her 2" without Scarlett Johansson, could the movie studio hire someone who sounds like Scarlett to play Samantha's character? I don't think this case is as simple as people make it out to be. Even Sam Altman's tweet: "Her", seems to confirm they took inspiration from the movie Her, so is it wrong to hire a voice actor that sounds like the character in the movie? If Sam had tweeted, "Scarlett", then it would be very different.